Josh went on a podcast to talk about evangelical culture

Hi there! Swedish listener here, and I thought I'd add some data points to the thing Josh says about social atomisation. It's definitely just as bad here, and in fact this conversation really shook stuff loose for me about the parallels between my own upbringing and what Josh and Brian talk about regularly on this show. I'm not evangelical, but I did grow up with a parent who was (and is) an extremely active local politician for the Social Democrats, who have of course been in government here for most of the past century (although they're not currently). I took an early interest in the same stuff and spent a lot of my childhood going around various youth groups connected to the party, and I think there are a _lot_ of similarities between the vibe there and that of Christian groups in the US. There's obviously a belief in one's own worldview and an emphasis on "missionary"/"evangelising" work, that's table stakes, but there's also a thing where the party and its ideology is seen as synonymous with everything good about the country, in a similar way to how American exceptionalism and evangelical Christianity seem to feed off one another. And on a purely institutional level, there's the same issues retaining members - especially young members - and it's for similar reasons. Obviously social democracy as an ideology is a lot more benign than Christian dominionism, but the party as it exists today pays about as much attention to its own platform as your average evangelical church does to Matthew 7:12. There's still this incredible faith in a "Party" that exists in people's heads and can do no wrong, which seems completely detached from the actual flesh-and-blood people who governed the country until last year, and that's why, like our lads, I eventually soured on the whole thing and felt compelled to leave. IDK how much of this actually makes sense and how much is just me looking for patterns and trying to get over my sense of betrayal, but in my head it's interesting, and I would be interested to hear if it makes sense to anyone else here. PS. The concept of "the Homeschool Building" will live in my head forever.

Ayyy, homeschool and co-ops! Josiah is speaking my language. I gotta see if there is somewhere that Josiah goes into his journey leaving and coming back as an Episcopalian. As an exvangelical I'm always interested in when people come back to Christianity after leaving and getting woke. I feel like even if I wanted to I couldn't accept any one religion now...